


By the Stars (I'll Speak Your Name)

by codenamecynic



Category: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game)
Genre: Angst and Romance, Boat Sex, Elf/Human Relationship(s), Explicit Sexual Content, M/M, Original Character(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-06
Updated: 2021-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-12 17:54:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29888325
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/codenamecynic/pseuds/codenamecynic
Summary: When Harper and party left him behind in the Xanathar's lair, Quirt never expected to see them again. Many days and many deaths later, Harper proves that he only makes promises he can keep.
Relationships: Taliesin Harper | Taliesin Ferryman/Quirt | Medhredel Wyrdhallow
Comments: 1
Kudos: 2
Collections: Alternative Ethics





	By the Stars (I'll Speak Your Name)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Fionavar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fionavar/gifts), [bettydice (BettyKnight)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BettyKnight/gifts), [Dakoyone](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dakoyone/gifts), [vhaerauning](https://archiveofourown.org/users/vhaerauning/gifts).



> A (sort of) sequel to [Good Blue](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25948609)

Everything looks different under the sun.

And that, Harper thinks, is a very stupid thing to say, even in the privacy of his own thoughts. _Of course_ everything looks different under the sun, it’s the _sun_. But also, that isn’t exactly the point.

Arrabar looks different every time he comes home, no matter how long it’s been since the last time he’s visited. A new warehouse here, a different storefront there, a woman selling flowers on the corner of Market and Crest instead of the old man who used to sell lemons so tart his mouth puckers at the memory. The streets look wider, or narrower, or both; cleaner and dirtier, just in places he doesn’t expect. It’s unsettling in a way he can’t articulate to anyone else, doubled vision, past overlaying the present until neither fits.

Maybe it’s just his eyes that have changed.

He’s frowning and he doesn’t even realize it until he feels the boat move beneath him with the shifting weight of another body, anticipating the stroke of soft fingertips between his brows a second before it happens so he doesn’t startle at the touch.

“You’re thinking again.”

“What? Me? How dare you, you know I don’t think.”

Quirt smirks, one corner of his lips lifting. The expression pulls at the scar that skips down the side of his face from brow to jaw; a near miss that Harper hasn’t yet had the chance to ask about. He reaches up to touch it, tracing the shape of a sharp, almost delicate jawbone with the backs of his fingers, feeling the ghost of the wound beneath his skin. It must have bled terribly; the thought makes him a little sick.

“I know that’s what you like everyone else to think.”

He blinks back to the present again, and then narrows his eyes at Quirt, dropping his hand. “Don’t start that again. I thought we agreed to disagree and then never to discuss it.”

“You agreed,” Quirt corrects mildly, unconcerned, propping himself up on an elbow so he can lean into Harper’s space. “I didn’t do anything of the kind.”

“Yeah, yeah.” It’s a conversation he isn’t really interested in having. That’s not why they’re here, lying side by side in the bottom of his little borrowed boat waiting for the stars to come out. 

He’s missed sailing, seizing the opportunity to take them out far past the breakwater until Arrabar is just a bright speck in the distance, the sun glinting off the waterfront windows. He can hear distantly the chiming of bells; it’ll be dark soon. Soon they’ll light the lamps, concentrating the glow from the city into small pockets like a cluster of stars right on the edge of the horizon.

That’s beautiful too, in a way, but he’s taken them out of reach, out to where the sea is flat and deep and looking north there’s nothing but sky for miles.

That used to scare him. It used to feel too big, too lonely, but he’s learned to love it. To miss it. He doesn’t put much stock in blood but the sea always calls to his, pulling at him like a fast current away from shore. He always runs back to the water, every time.

Is that what he’s doing now? Maybe so. He certainly jumped at the chance to cut dinner short, pruning back another awkward Ferryman family reunion into a shape more manageable, clipping away at it like a hedge full of thorns. 

How fucking dramatic, Taliesin, honestly.

Quirt is still watching him. _Medh_ , he reminds himself for the eighty-seventh time. Medhredel, not Quirt; same face, brand new name. Or old name, rather. The real one. He isn’t quite sure it suits him, but then who’s to say that a condescending nickname from a lovesick beholder is a better fit than the one he was born with. And it’s not like _Harper_ doesn’t know a thing or two about new old names.

Anyway. He takes a breath, smiles, shrugs his mood away like a cloak it’s too hot to wear. He’s being maudlin and that is exactly the opposite of what he’s trying to achieve here. Medh is a romantic and maybe Harper’s laying it on a little thick, but he’d rather too much than too little and either way Medh seems pleased. 

He looks different too, under the sun. His dark hair looks even darker, his eyes bluer against the _pale pale pale_ of his skin. For someone who’s lived underground for a decade he certainly kicked up a fuss about bothering with protection from the sun, and now the tops of his cheekbones and the tips of his pointed ears are red. Serves him right.

Really though it just makes him look flushed and young and pretty, healthy in a way that Harper hasn’t seen him before, mired sallow and drunk in the gilded cage of the Xanathar’s lair. It’ll be such a shame to send him back in chains of a different kind, responsibility for the stronghold and its populace like a yoke around his neck. Harper isn’t sure there’s a key for that kind of lock, especially if you fashion it yourself.

But that’s a thought for tomorrow. Tonight they watch the sun go down and the stars come up; tonight he keeps his promise.

“Hi,” he says, sitting up again so Medh does too, interrupting any other observations that might have been forthcoming.

“Hello.”

“Have I told you today that you’re beautiful?”

Medh blinks at that and laughs that startled laugh of his, the one that sounds like even he’s surprised to be hearing it. “Smooth.”

“The smoothest.” 

Over halfhearted accusations - _tease, incorrigible flirt_ \- Harper persuades Medh back into his arms, seated between his legs with his back against Harper’s chest. The edge of the bench they lean against digs hard into the middle of his shoulder blades, but this feels too good to move, warm and soft and undemanding. Quiet too, eventually, their conversation trailing off as the night deepens from purple to blue. Distantly the gulls call, finding their roosts, and then it’s just the gentle lap of water against the hull and the even quieter sound of Medh breathing. Slow and deep, almost as if he’s sleeping, but his fingers stroke along the bare skin of Harper’s forearm beneath his rolled up sleeve, tracing new patterns over the tattoos that become harder and harder to see as the light grows dim.

He doesn’t know why that makes him feel something, or what it is exactly that he feels. Something in his chest like a wave rising from beneath, a swell that bows the surface outward, not struggling to escape but forcing everything else to make room.

That isn’t something he’s ready to share or even look at too closely, and he puts it aside, rubs his stubbled cheek against the softness of Medh’s hair, burying himself in his scent.

This man is never going to smell like nature; he’s the least elfy elf Harper’s ever met, though he supposes that’s some kind of stereotype that he really ought not perpetuate. He certainly looks more at home here under a sliver of the moon than Harper can imagine him anywhere else, gleaming like a pearl.

“Are you warm enough?”

“Mmn,” Medh murmurs back, resettling himself in Harper’s arms as though it is a completely unremarkable thing. He hasn’t once cautioned him that somebody else might see. It’s been a long time since those wayward days, chasing but not chasing Cort on the beach, and yet he still expects it. That it isn’t forthcoming is… nice. 

This, he thinks, is nice.

Nice usually makes him think he’s dreaming, makes him want to panic, but not this time. He just holds a little tighter, a little closer, and waits for the stars to come out.

There are constellations on this side of the world that Medh doesn’t know. Harper points them out, guiding Medh’s hand as he sketches their shape in the air. They name the ones they both know together, make up new ones, laugh at one they decide is a wheel of cheese, named _Ceitidh_ in Katy’s honor. And eventually it happens, just as he thought it would; Medh turns in his arms and tilts his head to one side, gives Harper a long, thoughtful look, and kisses him.

Not that this is the first time - far from it. Medh knows what he looks like naked, what he tastes like, what he feels like from the inside. It’s not exactly new but it feels that way anyway, the first time it’s happened since Khem melted the magical anchor from Medh’s arm and set him free; the first time since Medh said he owed them something.

He’d been worried that it would feel wrong, that he would end up ruining the night by needing to pull away, but it feels nothing like it did before. There’s nothing sad or desperate in it, and they’re both sober. Debt is not a factor; he doesn’t feel like he’s taking advantage. Not even when Medh pulls him down into the bottom of the boat, into the nest of blankets damp with sea air, and quietly breathes his name. The real one.

He’s beautiful, Taliesin thinks. He really is. Beautiful and messy and beautifully messy with kiss swollen lips and a dark mark scraped along his throat from Taliesin’s stubbled chin. He looks like he’ll bruise if Taliesin holds him too tight, bites too hard, sucks blood to the surface of that pretty pale skin. It’s hard not to want to cover him in the remnant of his kisses, his shirt undone unevenly down the front, buttons skipped and one shoulder bare to expose the contour of a shadow-sharpened collarbone.

A collarbone. Ridiculous. This isn’t one of Katy’s horrible romance novels with their perpetually ripped bodices and effortlessly flowing hair. They’re about to fuck in the bottom of a boat, one with not quite enough space for all his lanky limbs, and yet. When he eases back to take a breath and Medh looks up at him all dark eyes and parted lips, it’s hard to remember that Medhredel Wyrdhallow is a three hundred-and-something year old wizard who’s been around the block more times than years Taliesin’s been alive. He looks soft and eager and oh so sweet, and all Taliesin wants to do is wreck him.

That’s- 

The thought makes him hesitate, taken aback by the dark, empty yawn of a sudden hunger, and forces his hands to unclench from where they’ve tangled themselves in Medh’s clothes. He starts to sit up and Medh stops him, long slender fingers of his right hand curled around Taliesin’s wrist.

“You don’t have to stop. I mean, you can. If you want to. But I don’t want you to.”

“What _do_ you want?” 

“This.” His voice sounds raw, like his throat hurts. That’s fair, Taliesin thinks. It’s a cursed question. “You.”

Well.

He’s never really been very good at stopping himself, even worse at saying no. Taliesin has so few defenses against sincerity, not when it seems so real. It’s always his downfall and yet down he goes. If this blows up in his face, at least this time he’ll have really worked hard for it.

"I just want to make you feel good," he says, half apology, as though it's some big secret. 

The smile Medh gives him is playful and patient. "I'm sorry, are you waiting for me to complain?"

And just like that the anxious tightness in his chest eases, loosening the squeeze around his lungs so he can breathe. 

He unwraps Medhredel like a present, peeling back layers of clothing, well worn but still fine. He likes that, he thinks, likes when the polish is off. It makes everything seem more tactile, more genuine, less like a shining mirage on the edge of his vision that he’ll never reach no matter how long he keeps stumbling forward. He could almost believe it was attainable, if he let himself.

Best not let himself. That’s not really what this is about anyway, Harper and his myriad of dramatics. The stars are out, brighter than enchanted diamonds in a false sky, and he traces constellations on Medh’s bare skin, licks a comet’s path down his belly, finds a new orbit in the wanting shift of hips beneath him and the tangle of clever fingers into his hair.

Medh is hard, already feverish with it, when Taliesin tugs apart his laces and eases his breeches down his thighs. Glorious and bare and unselfconscious in a way that must come somehow with age, he groans when Taliesin takes him into his mouth, head falling back with a quiet thunk against the wooden deck.

He’s a polite lover, even in receiving pleasure, much too polite to pull at Taliesin’s hair and hurry him along. Not even when he takes ages, takes him down his throat, swallows around him until Medh’s fingers have moved from clutching his shoulder to clutching the blanket beneath them, the small sounds he makes like suffering. 

It’s beautiful, makes Taliesin feel powerful. He’s still in most of his clothes and somehow it makes everything a little less frantic. It’s easier to remember what he’s about, harder to get distracted, the discomfort of his own hard cock pressing against the inside of his trousers distantly focusing. Plus it means he can still reach his pocket and the little bottle of oil he’s secreted inside that has blessedly managed not to leak through his clothes.

It’s not that he’s planned this - not exactly. He hadn’t wanted to make assumptions or take liberties, but at the same time it’s hard for him not to want to be prepared. Just in case.

Sure, Taliesin, whatever you say. As if Medh has said no to him ever, about anything, since the first moment they met. As if _he_ hasn’t been the one with misgivings, so set against being accidentally coercive he’s practically run the other way.

Mixed signals, a Taliesin Harper specialty. 

“May I?” he’s careful to ask, pulling away long enough to raise his head and search Medh’s face. 

He shivers when the heat of Taliesin’s mouth leaves his skin, fidgeting restlessly beneath him. Taliesin isn’t sure who is letting who go at their own pace now, but it’s endearing. “Yes. Please. Now.”

That makes Taliesin laugh, even as he uncorks the bottle with his teeth and spits the stopper wherever. The oil is warm from his body but still cool on his skin, and Medh makes the smallest sound in the back of his throat when Taliesin slicks a hand and wraps it around his cock. He strokes languidly, crown to base and back again, walking Medh back up to the precipice he descended when he initially pulled his mouth away.

The oil is messy and wet and it gets all over both of them, shining bright in streaks against Medh’s belly and across the top of his thigh, smudged by Taliesin’s arm. He’s already slick when Taliesin’s hand descends to gently palm his balls, fingers questing lower to stroke thoughtfully across the breach of his body.

Taliesin likes the way this feels, the instinctive clench as his fingers press in, testing, barely even inside. A shudder wracks Medh’s body, more anticipation he thinks than anything else, and he waits for it to pass, for consent to be given, before he pushes any further.

Medh nods and parts his thighs, swallowing back more of those little noises Taliesin wants to devour, hungry for them. They won’t be muted for long, he already knows; not if he does his job correctly.

Not that it’s hard. Medh is almost alarmingly receptive, leaning into affection like a cat but not half as demanding. As far as Taliesin wants, and no further; he’s very much like Vigo in that way, just twice as sarcastic. 

He has a hard time imagining Medh living Vigo’s ascetic lifestyle though, with his horses and herbs and handicrafts. There’s something in him that reminds Taliesin of himself, some need for interaction, a wanting not readily admitted to or easily satisfied.

That’s probably dangerous for both of them, with how things stand now. They’ll have to say goodbye soon enough and who knows how long it will be before…

Nevermind all that. He puts it from his mind, concentrates on making the body under his arch and writhe and open for him. For now he has all the time he could need to go as slowly as he wants to, gentle kisses against lifting hips as his finger strokes inside, long and slow and rhythmic as waves against the bow. He takes Medh back into his mouth when he presses in a second finger alongside the first, turning the hiss at the sudden burn into another of those low moans. Taliesin can feel him pulse between his lips and pulls back, fingers sunk deep and motionless until the subtle jerking of Medh’s hips subsides.

Above him Medh laughs and groans at once, covering his face, the heels of his hands digging hard into his eyes.

“You- what are you doing to me?”

Taliesin grins, crooks his fingers. “Want a description?”

“No, gods no, don’t talk. Don’t talk to me at all or I’m going to-”

“You can if you want to.”

“No.” Medh’s eyes appear between his fingers, peering down at Taliesin over the semi-barrier of his cupped hands. “I just want to enjoy this for a little while longer. Is that- is that stupid?” They roll shut when Taliesin curls his fingers again, pressing gently into the knot of nerves he can feel just beneath the rough pads of his fingertips, mouth going lax with a gasp and a whimper.

“Does it feel like I think it’s stupid?”

“You- I-”

There isn’t much more after that, nothing coherent anyway, when Taliesin takes him into his mouth again.

He makes it last, because he knows how to do that. Because Medh does nothing to stop him, letting him have his way, whatever he desires. Probably not a hardship, Taliesin figures, given where his mouth is right now, but by the time another of his fingers joins the first two and he's in so deep the heel of his hand presses hard against Medh's body it seems like Medh would argue otherwise, head thrown back and blankets white-knuckle gripped between his fingers. His pale skin glows ethereally in the blue-tinged moonlight, shadow sharpening the contours of his lean body, the muscles in his stomach and arms flexed tight and quivering.

He could do this forever, could keep this going until Medh comes apart whether he wants to or not and then further, and he thinks he almost has him there when Medh grates out his name and grabs his shoulder.

"Harper."

"Mmn?"

Medh's hand is burning hot on his skin, eyes wild and throat working hard as he swallows. "If you don't get up here right now, I'm going to set this boat on fire."

He sounds so earnest Taliesin can't help but burst out laughing, pulling his mouth away. "Can you swim?"

 _"Taliesin."_ Medh's laughing too but his voice breaks just a little, a desperate edge to it that sounds close to pleading. It doesn't feel right to make him beg and so Taliesin relents, gently drawing his fingers away, little kisses scattered on his hips and thighs like small apologies.

Not that they were necessary; Medh goes lax beneath him as Taliesin works his way up his body, patient and pliant as Taliesin kicks his pants off and settles himself between Medh's thighs.

"This alright?"

"More than."

Medh's hands are on his shoulders, in his hair, and Taliesin does not deserve to be looked at in that way; that soft, wanting way like he's a thing of wonder, something precious to be treasured.

He could be wrong though, probably is. He's never been particularly good at reading this sort of thing, and it wouldn't be wise to draw conclusions anyway. He's manufactured this moment so thoroughly, been so intentional about building desire, that it wouldn't be fair to hold Medh to anything he might be feeling in the moment.

As if he would.

They both groan as he pushes in, Taliesin's head dropping forward to rest against Medh's shoulder. Not hiding, just - it feels good, it always does, hot and tight and slick, tense with nerves but ready for him. They stay that way for a long while, rocked by the sea, bodies as close as they could ever get.

Medh moves first, flexing his hips to shift Taliesin inside him. It's easy to let him have his way, to find his angles and then to slowly give him more, give him what he needs.

They go slowly, terribly slow, just as much effort in it than if their pace had been frantic. He can feel sweat gather on his brow, roll down his spine, Medh's thighs wrapped so tight around his waist the only way he can move is to grind his hips, down and in and deep until Medh starts to tighten. The hand grasped in his own, held above both their heads, flexes tight, grip surprisingly strong for someone who looks as soft as Medh does; Taliesin lets himself kiss the gasps from Medh's lips, careful and gentle and about to shake apart with it.

He manages to hold himself up, to get some clearance between them, just enough to work a hand between their bodies to grasp Medh's straining cock. Medh’s eyes flutter shut, brow furrowed as he gives a desperate little shudder, crossing the threshold to the point of no return.

He comes - so beautiful, vulnerable, flayed open and laid bare in this moment of pleasure that Taliesin has to look away. He kisses his throat instead, guiding him through it, wringing what he can out of Medh between his hand and his hips until he goes limp, lax and quivering on the deck.

He's still hard, buried deep within Medh's body, but he isn't sure what he should do. It feels good, of course it does, but Medh looks so sweet, so soft and spent beneath him that to move at all seems too rough and unrefined, rutting into him like an animal. He wants to come, of course he does, but he doesn't _need_ to, beginning to gently pull away when Medh's thighs quicken around his hips.

"Don't stop."

"I don't want to hurt you."

"You're not. I want to feel you."

"It'll be a mess."

Medh looks up at him and laughs, and for once doesn't even sound sad. "As if I'm not already a mess."

He is, they both are, to their own varying degrees. But Taliesin doesn't want him to ask again, doesn't want him to need to ask for anything, and so he lets himself go.

It doesn't take long, just a series of hard, deep thrusts at a quicker pace, but he holds off long enough to try and make it a little bit good, kissing Medh's cheek, his lips, eyes closed only at the last moment when he forgets to breathe and exhales all in a rush, pleasure dismantling the tension in his body.

It takes more out of him than he thought, shaky and out of breath and trying so hard not to crush the pretty man beneath him when his arms protest at holding him up. He eases back ever so gently, slow and careful, a quiet kiss of apology when Medh winces anyway. They pull apart, giggling like idiots at the sound of wet skin sticking, and then Taliesin is naked on a boat in the middle of the night, washing come from his hands in the still-warm sea. He offers a quick word to Umberlee, the only god sailors pray to unironically, and sits back on his heels.

He's already cooling, the gentle breeze drying the salt on his skin, and when he looks over Medh hasn't moved much except to sit up and gather his long legs under him. He's not so transparent as to look unsure, but there's a small flicker of something like relief when Harper holds his arms out to him, wrapping them both in the blanket they've soiled.

Might as well just pitch that right into the sea, he thinks, pressing a kiss to the back of Medh's bare shoulder. The thought illogically makes him smile, and as though Medh can sense it he shifts in Harper's arms. 

"You're thinking."

"Only good things." It's mostly not a lie. Mostly. Even less so when Medh turns his head and kisses his stubbled cheek.

"Copper for your thoughts, then."

"Hmm." Well there's no way he's really answering that, even if he knew how to. There's no need to cast a pall over this bright moment. "Just thinking about the other day," he says instead, pushing that distant voice to the back of his mind. “When you were all dressed up for business in your fancy robes. All I could think about was peeling you out of them.”

Medh makes a sound somewhere like a snort and not at all like a swoon. “Liar.”

“I’m serious. I had to sit there and listen to Tansia Neverember threaten to cut off my balls, and the whole time I’m wondering what you’re wearing underneath your clothes. Very distracting. Very hard to parlay.”

Mehd rolls his eyes. “She did not threaten to cut off your balls.”

“Well not out loud, but she was thinking it.”

"She probably was."

"See."

"Poor you."

"Poor me is right, I almost died. You in a dress should be illegal."

 _"Robes,_ they're called _robes_ , Harper."

He huffs when Medh's sharp elbow catches him lightly in the ribs, laughing under his breath and scattering apologetic kisses over the backs of his shoulders. "Fine, fine, robes then. Still. Distracting."

"You're awful."

"And you still like me."

Medh sighs and casts Harper a look over his shoulder, mouth curving into a smile. "I suppose I do."

There it is again, that look like they're skirting the edge of some unspoken truth, and this time they both let it go, sighing and collapsing into each other as silence retakes the waves.

"Do you want me to take us back?" He says eventually, quietly, when Medh has gone so still in his arms he could be asleep.

"Not yet. Can we stay a while longer?"

"Whatever you want," he whispers back, a twist in his gut reminding him that he's telling the truth. "All these stars are for you."


End file.
